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When I look on thee and feel how dear,
How pure, and how fair thou art,
Into my eyes there steals a tear,
And a shadow mingled of love and fear
Creeps slowly over my heart.
...

[C. K. loquitur.]



I dreamed I was in fair Niphon.
Amid tea-fields I journeyed on,
Reclined in my jinrikishaw;
Across the rolling plains I saw
The lordly Fusi-yama rise,...

In the dim chamber whence but yesterday
Passed my beloved, filled with awe I stand;
And haunting Loves fluttering on every hand
Whisper her praises who is far away....

Let them say to my Lover
That here I lie!
The thing of His pleasure,
His slave am I.

Say that I seek Him
Only for love,
And welcome are tortures
My passion to prove.
...

Wise men I hold those rakes of old
Who, as we read in antique story,
When lyres were struck and wine was poured,
Set the white Death's Head on the board -
Memento mori.
...

A squad of regular infantry,
In the Commune's closing days,
Had captured a crowd of rebels
By the wall of Pere-la-Chaise.

There were desperate men, wild women,
And dark-eyed Amazon girls,...

The winter wind is raving fierce and shrill,
And chides with angry moan the frosty skies;
The white stars gaze with sleepless Gorgon eyes
That freeze the earth in terror fixed and still....

A sentinel angel sitting high in glory
Heard this shrill wail ring out from Purgatory:
"Have mercy, mighty angel, hear my story!

"I loved, - and, blind with passionate love, I fell....

REMARKS OF SERGEANT TILMON JOY TO THE WHITE MAN'S COMMITTEE OF SPUNKY POINT, ILLINOIS.

I reckon I git your drift, gents, -
You 'low the boy sha'n't stay;
This is a white man's country;...

I wandered through a careless world
Deceived when not deceiving,
And never gave an idle heart
The rapture of believing.
The smiles, the sighs, the glancing eyes,
Of many hundred comers...

One day in the Tuileries,
When a south-west Spanish breeze
Brought scandalous news of the Queen,
The fair, proud Empress said,
"My good friend loses her head;
If matters go on this way,...

A hundred times the bells of Brown
Have rung to sleep the idle summers,
And still to-day clangs clamouring down
A greeting to the welcome comers.

And far, like waves of morning, pours...

The beauty of the Northern dawns,
Their pure, pale light is thine;
Yet all the dreams of tropic nights
Within thy blue eyes shine.
Not statelier in their prisoning seas
The icebergs grandly move,...

The Countess Jutta passed over the Rhine
In a light canoe by the moon's pale shine.
The handmaid rows and the Countess speaks:
"Seest thou not there where the water breaks
Seven corpses swim...

I.

Wisely a woman prefers to a lover a man who neglects her.
This one may love her some day, some day the lover will not.

II.
...

I love a woman tenderly,
But cannot know if she loves me.
I press her hand, her lips I kiss,
But still love's full assurance miss.
Our waking life for ever seems
Cleft by a veil of doubt and dreams....

I'll tell the story, kissing
This white hand for my pains:
No sweeter heart, nor falser,
E'er filled such fine, blue veins.

I'll sing a song of true love,
My Lilith, dear! to you;...

The knightly legend of thy shield betrays
The moral of thy life; a forecast wise,
And that large honour that deceit defies,
Inspired thy fathers in the elder days,...

Roll on, O shining sun,
To the far seas!
Bring down, ye shades of eve,
The soft, salt breeze!
Shine out, O stars, and light
My darling's pathway bright,
As through the summer night...

Saith the Lord, "Vengeance is mine;
I will repay," saith the Lord;
Ours be the anger divine,
Lit by the flash of His word.

How shall His vengeance be done?
How, when His purpose is clear?...